Wikimedia has agreed to create a new section – a Wikipedia in the Egyptian Dialect. This decision was the catalysis for a discussion across the Egyptian blogosphere. Is it a good or a bad move, and is Egyptian and standalone language, or just a dialect of Arabic?

Wikimedia has agreed to create a new domain for Wikipedia in the Egyptian language, after some Wikipedia users have submitted a request to create such domain claiming that the Egyptian language is a standalone language that has its own vocabulary and rules which are different from the Arabic language, and is spoken by more the 70 million people.
There have been various requests to create domains for different languages/dialects such as the Sudanese dialect (the request currently is being discussed), the Algerian dialect (the request was refused in the 23rd of April 2007), and the Lebanese dialect (the request was refused in the 7th of November 2007).
The Egyptian Wikipedia currently contains 43 topics in the Egyptian slang, while there is a suggestion for the Arabic Wikipedia users to close the Egyptian section since they claim that the Egyptian is just an Arabic dialect and not a separate language.

Those guys have a wrong perception about the development history of the national languages in Europe, and they want to imitate what they believe is the best way for languages to evolve! You know, it is like that silly theory that claims that it was just the Latin language there, then it gave birth to all the other languages.
They also have a different perception about the role of languages to enforce people's national identity and nations development. And this is still related to their incorrect perception of the history of languages in Europe. They do not feel the value of having a common language that facilitates the communication with more people, even more than those who happen to be in the same geographic area when countries borders were created. And they also cannot see the effect of this on our accumulated knowledge and cultural products.
Their intention is good but they lack the knowledge and understanding. Anyway, we have nothing to lose here and at least we may learn something from their experiment.

I was really upset when I read your post, Rami.
I couldn't imagine that our Arabic language is going to deteriorate to this level.
Although there are different dialects, but still they are just verbal ones, and it is enough that someday Egyptians will not be able to understand Lebanese or Moroccan people when they talk. Traditional Arabic has always been the common language between us, and the one that we all understand easily.
Can you imagine what will happen after few generations when there will be Moroccan or Somali Arabic. It's a joke you know.
Anyway, I logged into the page where I can submit my disagreement to the idea, but it came out that it has been deactivated. Whom shall I talk to now to show my refusal?

The differences between languages and dialects is a source of huge debates, but when it comes to modern Arabic, most of the linguistics – who are by the way non Arabs, and are not affected by our ideological debates – believe that the variations in vocabulary and grammar between the Arabic dialects spoken nowadays are not enough to make them languages, which is somehow different than the Maltese, for example, which was based on the Arabic spoken in North Africa but it's a standalone language now.
I think that most of those who are with the Egyptian language are Egyptian and Coptic Nationalists and chauvinists who have problems in understanding the history of Egypt and its value as a state, and they also fail to understand ideologies such as ethnic, lingual and cultural pan-Arabism. They are affected by the cultural degradation we are now suffering from, and in such an era, calls like those are more common. These are calls that are also affected by the lack of understanding of the origin and evolution of languages, and their relation with our ethnic and national identity. Have a look in the Egyptian blogosphere and you will find tons of such ideas there.

First of all there is nothing called the Egyptian language.
There is an Egyptian dialect instead.
This is an unacceptable chauvinism.
And I hope that we do not murder our own Arabic language someday, to add one more disappointment to our ongoing disappointments.

I am totally against the new Egyptian dialect Wikipedia , now we got our localized version of Wikipedia , we got our own Egyptian dialect Wikipedia and I am sorry to say that it sucks.
Seriously it is ridiculous , I read in it some entries and I was shocked.
Look I do not know why people do not contribute more to the Original Arabic Wikipedia if they can spend hours contributing to the Egyptian dialect Wikipedia.!!??
May be they hate the Arabic grammar rules !!??
Well then I have a nice suggestion , I do not know if it is available or not but we can add spell and grammar checker to Arabic Wikipedia.
I do not know what the next will be ; a PortSaidi or Upper Egyptian dialect Wikipedia !!??

Such debate wasn't limited to the blogosphere only, but it spread out to Jaiku.

That was a big controversy in Wikimania Alexandria, lots of under the table politics.
IMO it's an insignificant project that's bound to fail. so not very important to think about anyway. and while fragmentation might sound like a bad idea the reality is most probably those who contribute to the “Egyptian” Wikipedia where not going to contribute to the Arabic one anyway.

Lasto Adri responded:

Even if its a limited project.. still its there.. and you can underestimate it now.. but tomorrow , it might me a different case.

Alaa reacted:

lol u guys are overreacting the benefits of having a unified language across the arab world are so high, no need to feel threatened.
if you're so worried about it do something, go help with arabic wikipedia and make the best source of knowledge there is in the arab world. that's the best way to insure that your children will know fos7a and like it too.

Think of it as a more intuitive scratch pad for developing articles in formal Arabic. So I might write an article in Egyptian dialect because, for me, it will consume less energy and time to write. Someone else might decide to contribute to it or transfer the information in it to the formal Arabic wiki. Exactly like what happens between the different Wikipedia languages.

Let me ask another question. Away from Wikipedia, I can see that we have two points of view out there, either in Wikipedia, or in Blogs, or even in a satellite channel like O-TV. Some may claim that we are Egyptian and that we have to be proud of our own dialect, and that the Arabic language has failed to evolve in the last 1400 years, and it is really useless to bond ourselves to a language that wasn't capable of evolving like any other language in the word. And those who hold such claim are mainly liberals, secular and Copts. While on the other hand others – Islamists and Pan-Arabists – believe that we have to protect traditional Arabic, because it facilitates our communication with other Arabs and it also is links us to our cultural and religious heritage, and they believe that abandoning the traditional Arabic language may affect our identity and widen the gaps between Arabs.
So who point of view do you agree with more?

I think that there are few ones in the two team who have the louder voice and those who make us see it that way.
Some people out there may listen to poems written in Egyptian dialect and read novels written in traditional Arabic, yet this has nothing to do with their ideologies.
People will never stop using the Egyptian dialect. It will last forever.
Also there are huge economical benefits of having a common language among all Arabs, so it will last forever too.
I also do not agree with you that Arabic doesn't evolve, it evolves but its evolution is in resonance with our civil evolution.
There are plenty of economical, scientific, and other matters that are more important than our debate whether we are Arabs or Egyptians.

I am with you, for sure not all those who blog in the Egyptian dialect are liberals, and also not all those who write poems in traditional Arabic are Pan-Arabists or Islamists. But we can't deny that some may prefer to use one more than the other based on their ideologies and not only based on the one they find easier.
And let me disagree with you about the evolution of Arabic as a language. We all know that some grammatical rules in Arabic are outdated and not acceptable nowadays, and this can be seen where the current dialects have abandoned them. But it is hard to liberate the Arabic language from such rules since we do not want it to be shifted away from the one the Quraan was written in. And also in our daily lives when we need to invent a new word it has to pass through language authorities first, which is the opposite to what happen in other languages where the evolution starts from the people and ends in the lab and not the other way round. In the English language, for example, words like “to Google”, and “robot” where invented based on a web application or science-fiction books, while here any evolution is only limited to labs and academies.

18 comments

I am an Arab-Syrian and I understand the Egyptian dialect the way I understand all Arabic dialects. What is the point behind considering the Egptian dialect a sort of a language? Does this mean that other Arab citizens who are interested in reading Egyptian blogs are not welcome on the basis that they don’t speak the same ‘so-called language’? I’m sorry, but this step doesn’t make any sense to me. I also decided to write this in English, and I’m not sure if my English is an American English, a British one, or a Canadian English. Perhaps, you can advise me in that regard.

According to that weblog, there must be several Egyptian languages. As far as I know, there are many stylistic, grammatical and morophological differences between the dialects of Upper Egypt, Lower Egypt, and Sinai. Can these ‘differences’ turn them into separate languages???

[…] Global Voices Online Egypt: Egyptian Dialect Wikipedia A group of Wikipedians has launched a wikipedia in Egyptian arabic, a split from the classical arabic edition that's been developed for some years on Wikipedia. Global Voices rounds up reactions. A few feel like it's easier to write in Egyptian arabic, while the majority seem to feel this is an anti-Islamist political statement, or simply a bad idea that will go nowhere. (tags: language translation arabic wikipedia blogs globalvoices) […]

– I didn’t single out Coptic Nationalists as the supporters. In fact I specifically mentioned “Egyptian Nationalists, and Coptic Nationalists who differ from the first only in being Christians” I really see no difference.

– I was referring to “Arab-ism” as a term which has cultural, linguistic, political, and ethnological aspects to it, that are confused by many of us, and is indeed intriguing.

– I was not referring to “Egypt and its role as a nation”, but was rather tackling “the concept of Egypt as state”

Should we blame this on the fact that I was commenting in my native Cairene Accent all the way? ;P I think this should have been noted as well, as it is significant.